Five Bangladeshi Nationals Held in Ukrainian Detention Centre

Five Bangladeshi nationals who had been arrested in Ukraine for not having any valid passport/visas are currently in a Ukrainian detention centre, said Foreign Minister Dr A K Abdul Momen.

The Bangladesh Government as well as the Polish Government are trying to repatriate them to Bangladesh immediately, said the foreign minister.

They had travelled to Russia to see a football match but later wandered into Ukraine without any valid document, so they were arrested by Ukrainian police, Momen added.

Earlier, there were allegations that many nationals of different countries are being held hostage in Ukraine to be used as human shields.

In Zhuravychi, only 130km away from the border shared by Ukraine and Belarus, about 120 human beings -- including women and children from different nations -- have been stranded in a former detention centre turned camp.

Among them, five were Bangladeshis and were arrested on Sunday.

"We have been tortured, and they took away our phones. I somehow managed to hide this phone, which came as a blessing as I'm being able to talk to you. They took away our phones in order to stop us from contacting the media. They imprisoned us and kept us here as hostages. We are being used as human shields. They don't even give us enough food to eat," – said Riyad Malik, one of the stranded Bangladeshis, reports Media.

The Ukrainian military is using the crew of the Bangladeshi cargo ship Banglar Samriddhi as a human shield, Russia's foreign ministry said in a statement on 3 March.

"We express our indignation over the actions of the Ukrainian military, who, contrary to international norms, have not allowed a Bangladeshi dry cargo ship to go to sea for several days and, having mined the port, are essentially using foreign civilian sailors as human shields," the report says.

Banglar Samriddhi had been stranded at the Olvia port of crisis-stricken country Ukraine with 29 sailors on board since Russia invaded the Eastern European country on 24 February.

Engineer Hadisur was killed after the ship came under a missile attack on 2 March in a conflict zone on Buh River.

After the attack, the crew members, in video messages from the ship, requested immediate help at the earliest. Later, they were evacuated to a nearby bunker on Thursday night.